1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a printer and a feeding apparatus for the printer.
2. Discussion of the Background
In a printer for printing on a sheet-like print medium, in order to improve the accuracy in feeding the print medium, it is known to place a guide member, which is formed in a cylindrical shape extending in the width direction of the print medium, in the way of feeding the print medium from a sheet supplying member to a print head, at a position capable of smoothly feeding the print medium to the print head. For example, JP-A-2003-252491 discloses such a printer. The contents of this publication are incorporated herein by reference in their entirety. Conventionally, a print medium is fed from a sheet supplying member to a print head by rotating a guide member 200 (see FIG. 5), which is formed in a cylindrical shape extending in the width direction for substantially the same length as the dimension in the width direction of the print medium and is rotatably disposed, regardless of the dimension in the width direction of the print medium even when the sheet-like print medium is large (for example, about 3 meters) in width.
Since the guide member 200 extends in the width direction for substantially the same length as the width of the print medium, however, twist and warpage are easily occurred in manufacturing the guide member 200 and an installation error is also easily caused in installing the guide member 200 to a printer because the guide member 200 is long in the width direction. Accordingly, when the guide member 200 is rotated with a state installed to the printer, the rotational trajectory of the periphery of the guide member 200 should be wavy as seen in the width direction so that the feeding distance of the print medium is hard to be constant. Therefore, there is such a problem that the accuracy in feeding the print medium is deteriorated.